Lemon cleared her throat. ‘Aye, right, we legged it on their arrival, same as you, but the tales since, weeell, they suggest there was something of a set-to.’

Rennic gazed at her from beneath lowering brows. ‘A set-to?’

‘A fracas. A ruckus. A brouhaha.’

‘Nine fucking hells, Lemon, spit it out!’

‘Aye, well the wildest tales suggest that during the aforementioned altercation, the Gracechurch was somewhat … levelled.’

‘Horseshit.’

‘I did describe said tales as the wildest of their ilk.’

‘There’s no chance, the place is … You’d have to grind the walls down with engines for months, they’d still be chipping away at the curtain wall even now—’

‘Aye, all right, all right, I only know what I heard, boss.’

Chel thought of the smell of burning on the wind the day they fled the Gracechurch, and wondered.

‘Irrespective,’ Loveless said over Lemon’s protestations, ‘for every gambit failed, a gambit won – and vice versa. We’re on the blade’s edge here. Our next stop can sink us, or save us.’ She was leaning against the piebald wall of the staging inn, and for a moment Chel thought she looked as tired as he felt. He spotted that Whisper was keeping close to her, within easy reach. She must be as concerned as Chel.

‘Denirnas,’ Rennic said, fast enough to remind everyone he was in command.

‘Denirnas,’ Loveless repeated, as if crediting Rennic with the correct answer to a question she’d asked. ‘Alliance with the Norts. We bring Kosh’s people on-side, Corvel and his forces will quickly feel the noose begin to tighten.’

Chel stared down at his hands. Back to Denirnas. Back to where it had all begun. Unprompted, his shoulder began to throb.

‘If you ask me,’ Lemon said, ‘we can’t get rid of the wee shite fast enough. She’s toxic, that one, just like her nasty brews.’

‘Funny, Lemon,’ Loveless shot back, ‘she says the same about you.’

‘Now listen here—’

‘Keep yourself together, Lem, just a little while longer. We need them to like us when we propose alliance, remember?’

‘I’m being fucken nice! I’m being a fuck-sight nicer than her behaviour—’

‘Just a little longer, Lemon. Take deep breaths.’

‘Do you all see that? She’s fucken smirking at me! She’s—’

‘It still might not be enough.’ Rennic’s eyes were on Kosh but his words were for Loveless. ‘We have to consider—’

‘No.’

‘You know people there, important people.’

‘No.’

He swung to face her. ‘If just one of the pieces of our plan doesn’t fall into place, especially after our failure with the free cities—’

‘No! The Norts will be enough, they’ll be the key you wanted, the dagger in Corvel’s back. Pressure in the north. His forces split, nowhere safe – he’ll be begging for parley before the crops begin to turn.’